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Why are so many lawyers politicians?
Johan Richter, a loyal MR reader, writes to me:
As the primary elections are coming up is is interesting to note that so many of the contenders are lawyers, something that is also true of the members of Congress, where I believe half are lawyers. Why are so many US politicians lawyers? It seems odd considering that A) Legal training seems unnecessary for performing the main job of a politician, regardless of whether one takes that to be courting public opinion or governing the country. And there is hardly any deficit of lawyers in Washington to ask for advice if legal knowledge turns out to be needed. B) Being a lawyer isn’t very prestigious as far as I know. Being a military, doctor, police officer, businessman or perhaps even a academic would surely be regarded by many voters as more respectable professions than being a lawyer. C) Other countries don’t have nearly the same over-representation of lawyers in their parliaments as the US does.
I thought Google would yield a paper on this question but I can't find it. My guess is that lawyers are good at fundraising and good at developing personal contacts. This helps explain why fewer politicians are lawyers in many other countries; money is more important in American politics. A lawyer also has greater chance to exhibit the qualities that would signal success in politics, such as the ability to persuade and the ability to speak well on one's feet. Not to mention that many lawyers have ambition.
Natasha, who is a lawyer, adds that law generates an outflux of people to many other fields, not just politics. There is also a path-dependence effect, by which a previous presence of politicians in law breeds the same for the future. What else do you all know about this?
Addendum: I've posted a version of this query over at Volokh.com as well; I expect they will have something to say about the question.
Second addendum: Over at VC, Shawn says:
You will also find that Real Estate and Insurance agents are disproportionately represented in politics, at least at the more local levels.
These professions (along with practicing law) provide the career flexibility for would be politicians to put their jobs on hold or scale them down a few degrees while pursuing elected office or serving is such an office.
This flexibility also is what attracts people who wish to be career politicians, so that they have a job to fall back on between election seasons that won't trap them into long term obligations, keeping them from the next election cycle or serving if elected.
These careers also give would be politicians a good place to get recognition and network within their communities.
Third addendum: Bob Tollison writes to me: "McCormick and I devote a chapter 5 to why lawyers dominate legislatures in our book-- Politicians, Legislation and the Economy, Martinus Nihoff, 1981. Lawyers are better at combining being in the legisture with making outside income. Hence, lawyers dominate low legislative pay states because seats have a higher present value. Women dominate high pay states."
Posted by Tyler Cowen on January 23, 2008 at 06:14 PM in Law, Political Science | Permalink
Comments
Maybe because being a lawyer sucks. So lawyers look for other opportunities to make a living more often than doctors, military, academics etc. And since others have blazed that trail alread, politics is a good option.
Posted by: Danny from Milwaukee at Jan 23, 2008 6:05:24 PM
I think this would make for a very interesting research project. You also have to consider that many people have law degrees, but only practiced traditional law for a short time if at all. Path-dependence might be a good answer since many of the founders had legal training, but I feel like it isn't the whole story. The real question is why it is so in the U.S., but not nearly the same way with other countries. There are plenty of reasons why lawyers are more likely to go into politics, but why the large over-representation. I wouldn't be surprised if lawyers give more money to political campaigns than average and particularly to other lawyers. I find the money hypothesis appealing. Lawyers on average aren't usually wealthier than doctors or businessmen, but the average lawyer is more politically ambitious than either group. Since money is such an incredible barrier in American politics at the Federal level, I would suspect that the money (them being wealthy on average with good fundraising prospects) and ambition drive most of the story. One way is to compare State Legislators to Federal Congressman. You're able to control for many of the differences within the population while changing how much the race will cost. Might be a way to start.
Posted by: John at Jan 23, 2008 6:11:15 PM
My guess (as a political science professor who never really had any desire to get a J.D.): many politicians went to law school after being political science majors in college because they "liked politics." I think it's almost seen as a career path.
Lawyers (and medical doctors, who are also overrepresented in Congress) probably also have more of the flexibility in time that it takes to be a state legislator in the U.S., which doesn't pay enough to be a full-time occupation in most states; they can shut down or backburner the law practice for 2-4 months of the year while they're at the state capital and earn money the rest of the year, which isn't an option for most folks. And since it's hard to get into Congress without experience at the state level, that could be a major factor limiting the career paths of other potential politicians.
Posted by: Chris Lawrence at Jan 23, 2008 6:11:55 PM
I believe Bryan Caplan touches on this issue in his book - Myth of the Rational Voter. As Caplan puts it, lawyers are professionally trained to advocate sincerely and passionately for a particular position, regardless of whether or not they personally believe in it. This skill comes in handy for a professional politician.
Posted by: Don at Jan 23, 2008 6:15:06 PM
Actually, I think that in many practice areas
being a lawyer offers a fairly holistic, "top-down" view of the subject
matter, whether that be a business, industry, deal, piece of litigation.
The same seems true of government, and so an aptitude
(or preference) for that aspect of the law wouild seem to translate
to government well.
And I don't agree that law is necessarily not prestigious. The prevailing
opinion of laywers may be one of dislike, but it is also that lawyers are
intelligent. Such a presumption would seem to be positive for a
lawyer-candidate when running for office.
Posted by: MLKH at Jan 23, 2008 6:15:49 PM
Compared to most other countries, the US has an awful lot more lawyers, and an awful lot more smart and ambitious people going to law school. The main reason seems to be that college is viewed much less as a vocational training than in other countries, and especially so by highly talented people with lots of professional potential. These people then go to law (or business) school after working in some random analyst job for a few years after college, but ultimately decide that being a lawyer for the rest of their life just isn't all that interesting.
Posted by: Commenterlein at Jan 23, 2008 6:17:29 PM
many people who would have ordinarily gone into politics, bide their time by going into law first. this applies to those for whom politics is a family business (e.g., Ted Kennedy, Al Gore); and to those who are interested in government and politics (such as poli-sci majors), but who need to get a job and suddenly realize that there are no english or philosophy factories out there.
the other reason is that many of the "best" (and by best, you might as well substitute "most prestigious") legal jobs are in government - the top of the heap is often considered being a clerk for a judge, but there is also the chance to work in the Solicitor General's office, or the DOJ (in DC), or working the regional US Attorneys' offices around the country. these jobs naturally lead to politics (e.g., giuliani).
two other categories of lawyer-politicians apply more generally to pretty much any occupation. one is for those who have made shit-tons of cash, and thus can run for government just like all the other gazillionaires (compare Edwards with Corzine). finally, there are those who married in law school, were fortunate enough that their spouse did very well, and could then ride their spouses' coat-tails to power (compare Hillary with Elizabeth Dole).
and then there's Obama. as with so many other categories, he just doesn't fit the mold.
Posted by: esq at Jan 23, 2008 6:20:34 PM
To drive the discussion in the direction of the political science literature, there's Fox and Lawless (AJPS, 2005), Fowler (PS, 1995), and Maestas et al. (APSR, 2006) for starters.
Posted by: Chris Lawrence at Jan 23, 2008 6:22:37 PM
I don't have any insight here as to why we have so many lawyers in politics, and I apologize for commenting anyway. That said....
I am personally disturbed by the large number of lawyers in politics. Lawyers are effectively trained that your gain is my loss, that I can gain only if you lose. This is probably why lawyers are more likely than any other profession to not tip at all in restaurants (US anyway).
Why is this disturbing? Because economics is not zero sum, and often the best path, regardless of one's normative biases, is counterintuitive, especially for those trained in zero sum thinking. This explains why someone like John Edwards promises "to stick it to the corporations" (I'm paraphrasing, although I wouldn't be surprised if that was verbatim), despite the fact that the people most hurt by corporate taxation in the long run are workers.
Not to mention the fact that zero profits equals zero employees, a concept I suspect he hasn't thought of. Certainly his beloved union organizers haven't thought of it, or at least hope to con their victims into beleiving.
Posted by: happyjuggler0 at Jan 23, 2008 6:24:17 PM
Mankiw on why there are so few economists in politics.
Posted by: Biomed Tim at Jan 23, 2008 6:26:15 PM
It seems like a lot of the lawyers contending in the primaries started their careers in the district atorneys office doing public prosecution. Rising in ranks and gaining popularity by winning trials enabled them to get seats in important offices like mayors, senators and such.
In Denmark however, the current and former prime minister are economists.
Posted by: Sune at Jan 23, 2008 6:29:38 PM
Tocqueville has a whole section on how Lawyers are the natural aristocracy in a democracy and how legal training is important in officers of a democracy.
Posted by: Charles at Jan 23, 2008 6:32:03 PM
I don't know the exact numbers but in Brazil a lot of politicians are lawyers too. In fact, this is true since the student's political movement (which in Brazil tend to be the begging of most politicians' career) while people are still in college and the students from Law School tend to be extremely overrepresented.
Posted by: antonio at Jan 23, 2008 6:34:06 PM
Most elected politicians are legislators. Their job is to make laws. Lawyers are those professionals whose job it is to study and apply laws. They're the best qualified to make laws. The mystery, given the low reputation of lawyers, is why the public so often rightly elects lawyers.
Posted by: Zippy at Jan 23, 2008 6:34:14 PM
Australia has a very similar situation, with economists coming in second!
Posted by: Patrick at Jan 23, 2008 6:35:07 PM
In Florida (at least until recently), the only advertising a lawyer could do was to put his or her name on a political campaign. Win, lose, or draw, the lawyer could count on some business. Many stayed in politics.
Regards
Posted by: John Johns at Jan 23, 2008 6:38:35 PM
Zippy is right -- remember that the US legal system is more prescriptive than common law. It takes lawyers to write the laws, understand the laws, bend the laws and "reform" the laws they break.
Lawyers are upper caste; they speak a secret language the voters do not understand, but voters DO realize they need to reelect a lawyer if they are going to get anywhere.
If laws had to be written in plain language, the path-dependency would end.
Posted by: David Zetland at Jan 23, 2008 6:40:46 PM
Haven't you asked the question backwards? I think you are wondering why so many politicians are lawyers rather than the reverse.
Posted by: Eric H at Jan 23, 2008 6:47:17 PM
"B) Being a lawyer isn’t very prestigious as far as I know." I couldn't agree more. Attached is a NY Times article from 2 weeks ago solidifying that statement.
Posted by: Mike Mogie at Jan 23, 2008 6:54:59 PM
A couple of thoughts:
1) Your title question is phrased wrong. The issue is not why so many lawyers are politicians, it is why so many politicians are lawyers. And, yes, that is a lawyerly distinction, but it is also one likely to be made by an economist.
2) In order to be a successful politician, you need to convince people you will be good at the job. Convincing voters is obvious, but you also need to convince a variety of backers: fundraisers, party leaders, special interests. These people are concerned with the type of legislator you will be, rather than the type of person you are (ultimately, the benefit to them translates into what kind of legislation is passed or not). There is obviously going to be a strong correlation between your understanding of the law and how it works and your ability to be an effective legislator (particularly since political compromises are often worked out in the details of a bill).
3) People with law degrees correlate with three traits: intelligence, strong work ethic, and an interest in policy and government. Presumably, those traits correlate strongly with successful politicians, as well, regardless of whether they are JD's or not.
4) This is the dumbest thing I have read today: "Lawyers are effectively trained that your gain is my loss, that I can gain only if you lose. This is probably why lawyers are more likely than any other profession to not tip at all in restaurants (US anyway)."
Posted by: Dave at Jan 23, 2008 6:56:47 PM
Lawyers can speak about the details of a law much more effectively than someone from a different profession. Furthermore, they can usually write well quickly and to the point.
Look at the laws of any state - these are things that a politician either needs to understand himself or have someone explain to him. Obviously, lawyers have an easier time "getting involved" with legislation as an insider. Furthermore, one of the big tasks of government appointees is the drafting and implementation of new legislation. If you want to go into state government as a representative, it is helpful to have some experience a state level appointment position - and lawyers have the relevant experience for that.
Posted by: hrh at Jan 23, 2008 7:03:04 PM
Of 22 Canadian Prime Ministers, 17 practiced law or went to law school.
Posted by: Adrian at Jan 23, 2008 7:04:11 PM
There are a lot of reasons, a couple that I didn't see mentioned above.
1. the sheer number of lawyers in the U.S.
2. path dependence (people become lawyers because they want to be politicians)
3. more speculative, perhaps its because they know they'll end up as lobbyists afterwards.
Posted by: Michael Bishop at Jan 23, 2008 7:07:16 PM
I agree with some of the posts above, that our government is designed centrally as a system of laws and attempts to insulate us from individual decision-makers to a greater degree than in other countries. On this playing field law is paramount, where in other countries perhaps more lee-way is given for individuals to freely shape the actions of their government without utilizing laws to as large a degree.
Posted by: Shane M at Jan 23, 2008 7:07:27 PM
I would have to disagree with the idea that money is less important in other political systems outside the United States. Money politics is known basically world-wide, with Japan being an excellent example. Though the LDP did lose several elections, they regained their prominence because they have all the money.
The sheer number of lawyers the USA pumps out each is probably a contributing factor. We simply make too many lawyers, so it makes sense that these guys go into other professions where they could be more successful.
Posted by: Sean Towey at Jan 23, 2008 7:09:06 PM
